In 1979, Iran’s revolutionaries — an alliance of Marxists and Islamists — rose on promises of justice and equality. They pledged to give citizens free water, free electricity, and free housing. The slogans captured a nation’s imagination, uniting two ideologies that despised each other but shared the same illusion: that moral purity and government control could replace economic discipline. Within years, the illusion collapsed. Inflation exploded, jobs vanished, and the regime they created silenced its own believers.
Half a century later, in a different world and under a different flag, the same rhetoric echoes in New York City.
Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani, now running for mayor, calls for “people-powered politics” and promises “free” public services — fare-free buses, frozen rents, and new programs that would expand government dependency under the banner of compassion. It’s a playbook familiar to anyone who has studied revolutionary populism: identify inequality, moralize the problem, and promise paradise without explaining the cost.
Analysts estimate that making city buses free would erase about $700 million a year in fare revenue. Replacing that money would either require massive new taxes or more state debt. The Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) already loses roughly $1 billion annually to fare and toll evasion, including more than $500 million on buses alone. The Independent Budget Office projects multi-billion-dollar city deficits through 2028. To date, Mamdani has offered no serious proposal to offset the hundreds of millions in lost revenue.
That mindset is not new. In 1979, Iran’s revolutionaries said oil revenues would pay for everything; in 2025, New York’s progressives say “the rich” will. The numbers never add up, but the slogans keep working because they appeal to emotion, not reason.
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Adding to the picture, the Washington-based lobbying group NIAC, often criticized for mirroring Tehran’s foreign-policy positions, recently announced its official endorsement of Mamdani. The symbolism is striking: the same organization that has long echoed and defended the Islamic Republic now throws its support behind a socialist-leaning candidate in America’s financial capital. The thread that connects them is ideological, a shared belief that moral virtue justifies economic fantasy.
This convergence of left-wing utopianism and moral absolutism should alarm anyone who cares about the survival of pragmatic politics. When ideology replaces arithmetic, cities fall into the same trap that ensnared nations. The faces and languages change, but the structure remains: emotional populism promising equality through control.
Iran’s tragedy began with chants about justice and dignity. Within a decade, the alliance between communists and clerics disintegrated, replaced by censorship, executions, and an economy under siege. The rhetoric of equality gave way to ration cards and ideological policing.
New York is obviously not Tehran. But when candidates promise unlimited benefits and moral purity while ignoring budgets, they are playing the same dangerous tune. No city, no matter how rich, can outspend reality. Populism always runs on borrowed time and borrowed money.
The warning isn’t about religion or class. It’s about patterns. In every era, radicals on the Left promise that compassion can be legislated and that economics will obey moral will. It never does. When leaders treat economics as politics and politics as faith, collapse follows.
In 1979, Iran’s revolutionaries told people to look up, and many claimed to see Ayatollah Khomeini’s face in the moon. The illusion was complete. New Yorkers shouldn’t make the same mistake on the skyline. Charisma is not competence, and utopia is never free.
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Dr. Aidin Panahi is an Iranian-American research professor, energy expert, and political activist. He is the co-founder of the “From Boston to Iran” initiative, and his analyses on security and policy issues have appeared in outlets including The Jerusalem Post, Washington Times, the Jerusalem Strategic Tribune, Middle East Forum, Homeland Security Today, and Visegrád24. X: @Aidin_FreeIran
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.
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